Elon Musk's social media network X has caused widespread backlash after people employed its AI chatbot Grok to manipulate images of females by stripping their garments.
Multiple instances have emerged where the technology has been used to virtually strip women to render them in swimwear non-consensually, as well as to insert them in sexually explicit situations.
Developer Reaction and Regulatory Position
XAI, the company that created Grok, did not respond to questions, aside from an standard response stating "legacy media lies".
A government spokesperson stated that new laws is being introduced to prohibit image stripping software. Under a new criminal offence, anyone who supplied such tools would "receive a prison sentence and significant penalties".
"X or Grok is capable of halting these types of misuse if they wanted to," said a law professor, adding they "operate with a lack of consequences."
Oversight Body Position and Platform Functionality
The regulator Ofcom said tech firms must "assess the risk" of people seeing illegal content on their services, but did not specify whether it was at this time looking into X or Grok in regarding AI-generated images.
Grok is a free artificial intelligence—with some additional functions—which answers X users' prompts when they mention it in a tweet.
It is frequently used to offer commentary or further context to other posters' comments, but people on X are also capable of modify an posted picture through its artificial intelligence picture modification tool.
History of Criticism and Policy
The tool has been condemned for permitting users to produce pictures and videos with explicit content and sexually suggestive content, and it was earlier accused of creating graphic content of public figures.
"X has been permitting the production and sharing of these images for a long time without taking any action and we have yet to see any challenge by regulators," Professor McGlynn added.
XAI's own usage rules bans "portraying likenesses of persons in a sexually explicit fashion".
In a comment, Ofcom said it was illegal to "make or circulate non-consensual intimate images or child sexual abuse material" and confirmed this included explicit AI images created with AI.
It said services such as X were obligated to take "necessary measures" to "minimize the risk" of users viewing illegal material on their platforms and to remove it swiftly when they learn of it.
